March 15/02 8:27 am - Green Wins & Jeanson Loses Lead at Redlands

Posted by Editor on 03/15/02

Green Wins, Jeanson Loses Lead

We have reports from Saturn and Talgos America

Saturn

The third stage of the Redlands Bicycle Classic brought the men and women competing at the Classic around Lake Mathews, through the nearby valleys, and finished the final difficult kilometers on the top of the infamous Oak Glen.

The story of the day was Saturn rider Judith Arndt's amazing ride. Covering a Rona attack at mile one in the 81 mile race, the German rider found herself with Andrea Hannos with a 15 second gap on the field. With Yellow Jersey Genevieve Jeanson and second place Saturn's Lyne Bessette still in the main field, the peloton seemed unconcerned with the two women up the road. Soon the break had established a minute, with Arndt doing all the work into the fierce cross wind. Hannos, with her teammate Jeanson in Yellow was content to sit on a laboring Arndt.

When the gap was established at a minute a group of eight formed including three of Hanos' Rona teammates, including the very strong Manon Jutras, two Cannondale/USA riders, Suzy Pryde (Talgo) and Arndt's Saturn teammate, Kim Davidge. The Rona team did their best to come to terms with the growing time gap, but Arndt was on fire and soon had a 4:35 gap to the chasing group of eight and nine minutes on the main peloton.

Although it seemed unlikely that Arndt would be able to hold off the concerted chase taking place behind her, her practice from her winning break at Tour de Snowy only 10 days ago must have been of some assistance. Staying steady and determined, the Saturn rider reached the bottom of the final ten kilometer climb with the chase group of eight minutes behind, and Jeanson's group 15 minutes behind. Hannos tried mightily to hang with Arndt on the final climb, but the Saturn rider's fear of Jeanson somehow being able to still catch her motivated her up the final kilometers, dropping Hannos and finishing with a record breaking time to claim the win and the Yellow Leader's Jersey, as well as the respect of everyone who knows the effort it took to ride into the wind, solo for 79 miles.

Two minutes, fifty-five seconds later Hanos crossed the line. Meanwhile, Jeanson's impressive climb brought her up to and then through the chasing group for a third place finish, 9:58 behind Arndt. Pryde finished in fourth and Bessette was fifth. Asked how she managed to win in such a way, a very tired Arndt smiled shyly, exclaiming "You have no idea how I felt. I thought Jeanson would catch me on the climb."

Interestingly, a similar situation unfolded in the men's race. An early break with Chan McRae (USPS), Kirk O'Bee (Navigators), Chris Wherry (Mercury), Doug Ziewacz (7-UP), and David Loughlin (Lombardi Sports) was tagged by Saturn's Eric Wohlberg. Wohlberg was the highest placed on the General Classification, but everyone in the break had their own reasons to work it, thus the gap steadily opened.

However, the young and keen Prime Alliance Team, unwilling after yesterday's battle to let the Leader Chris Horner's Yellow Jersey go easily, set a hard and steady chase, bringing the group to terms on the final climb. From there, the climbers came to the fore, with Roland Green (Canadian National) winning the stage over the very fit and impressive Horner. Saturn's Soren Petersen had an impressive ride, finishing in third. Horner continues to dominate the race, proving his declaration that once he had the Yellow Leader's Jersey he would not let it go.

This is a telephone report from Chris Komar, so we are using it to fill in some of the details of the women's race. Basically, Rona began attacking from the gun, and kept it up until Hannos got away, covered by Arndt. Arndt then went to the front and pulled for most of the race.

Behind, there was very little action initially, with Saturn forcing the other teams to take up the chase. At the 30 kilometre mark a group of 10 broke free, including Erin Carter, Manon Jutras, Kim Davidge and Susy Pryde. The gap was soon Arndt and Hannos, the chasers at 2 minutes and the peloton at 6 minutes. The gap would continue to grow, as Arndt put forth an incredible effort. by the base of the final 10 kilometre climb, the lead duo were 8 minutes in front of the chasers and close to 15 in front of the peloton.

Arndt dropped Hannos and soloed in for the victory, with Hannos second. But the story behind was Jeanson rocketing up the climb to finish third. According to Komar, Jeanson came straight through the chasers, with only Pryde able to hang on (for less then a kilometre). Bessette was also impressive, coming within 300 metres of catching Pryde at the line.

However, the gap is now 7:37 for Jeanson to make up. The final stage circuit race is extremely hard, but will Arndt recover enough by Sunday to hold off Jeanson?